


Ghosts of Summers Past

by Asynca



Category: World of Warcraft
Genre: Angst, Character Study, F/F, a terrible idea really, sylvaina
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-14
Updated: 2018-11-14
Packaged: 2019-08-23 10:16:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,413
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16617065
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Asynca/pseuds/Asynca
Summary: Jaina and Sylvanas visit Arthas' makeshift grave together.This was originally a crack prompt I gave myself ("Sylvanas drags Jaina to Arthas' grave to have sex on it as a final 'fuck you' to him"), but it took on a terrifying life of its own and instead it's an angsty character study.





	Ghosts of Summers Past

 

“Do you like what I’ve done with the place?” Sylvanas’ question seemed harmless enough; however, as she said it, she fanned her hand out across the landscape Jaina had teleported them to.

Jaina could barely bring herself to look about them. Once, Tirisfal Glades had been a patchwork of rich farms full of crops and livestock, and the main road had been bustling with people travelling to and from the capital.  As a girl Jaina had been amongst them, and even now she could close her eyes and remember the route to Dalaran by heart. Now, those same fields lay blackened, barren and silent. An acrid green mist hung low to the ground, and not a soul was anywhere to be seen. “Quite an improvement, wouldn’t you say?”

Jaina wasn’t in the mood for her partner’s mind games, whatever purpose they served this time. “Not now, Sylvanas.” Getting her bearings, she turned and began to walk along the broken road. Her eye was on a farmstead just over the hill.  

Sylvanas jogged a little to catch up. “Oh, please. Don’t tell me it doesn’t bring you some joy to know how much he’d hate what I’ve done to his home after how he let you pine for him for years.”

Jaina stopped her for a moment, putting a firm hand on her wrist. “This was my home too.”

Sylvanas didn’t even blink. “Yes, for a time I imagine you may have thought so. But now you’ve returned to your real home full of people who _actually_ love you.”

Jaina’s grip tightened. For a moment, she wanted to fire something cutting back at her—but she knew fighting here would achieve nothing. Instead, she shook her head, threw Sylvanas’ arm away from her, and resumed her march to the farmstead.

Sylvanas wasn’t far behind, and caught up to her again. They walked in silence for a few moments, before Sylvanas spoke again, more subduedly. “My apologies,” she said. “I went too far, it wasn’t my intention to wound you. I know seeing the land like this must be a shock.”

Jaina gave her a sideways glance, expecting to see that smirk—but it wasn’t there. Exhaling, Jaina slowed her pace.

They walked a little further. Jaina could feel Sylvanas’ eyes on her, but as usual, she couldn’t fathom at all what Sylvanas was thinking until she spoke. “I want you to know it gives me no pleasure to destroy people’s homelands,” she said. “But you must understand, Jaina, that my people, the people who were born here, raised here and who died here, _they_ are the true owners of Lordaeron. It is _their_ home, and they deserve safety and peace to go about their lives. Blight is the only effective way to keep your Alliance away from us.”

Jaina’s lips pressed together a moment. “I know,” she said, and then looked across at her. “Can we not speak of this now? You’re not here as Warchief, and I’m not here as Lord Admiral. Let’s just be us.”

Sylvanas’ face was unreadable. “As you wish.” She spoke no further of their surroundings.

The Balnir farmstead didn’t look as Jaina remembered it. The roof was burnt out and it was empty—abandoned so quickly there were tools lying in the field and gates left wide open. The stables were destroyed, too—the iron pried from the walls and looted. On the ground inside lay the bones of the horses who hadn’t managed to escape.

Jaina paused by the door. In summer when the horses had all been out with soldiers, the Balnirs had stored hay in here, and it had been a pleasant place to sit out of the sun. Pleasant, and very private. Arthas had led her there many times, out of sight and into his arms, before everything happened with—

 “Where is it, then?” Sylvanas sounded impatient.

Jaina took a breath, shaken back to the present. “On the hill,” she said. “At least, that’s what I’m told.”

Behind the farmstead, there was a stone pillar exactly where Jaina had been directed it would be: on a small embankment, plain, and unmarked so as to prevent it being defaced. It leant slightly off centre and the ground around it hadn’t been levelled. No one had put great effort into setting in there. No care at all had been taken with it. With the fresh memory of young Arthas—her Arthas—on her mind, that made Jaina unexpectedly melancholy.

He’d been a boy once. That laughter, that bright smile; she could remember it far too clearly. He’d been so much fun! Riding together through the woods, sneaking into places they shouldn’t be, his hand over her mouth so her giggles didn’t alert Uther as to where they were. She was an apprentice mage, a rising star of Dalaran, and he was the golden-haired Prince of Lordaeron. For all those years, the sun absolutely shone out of him; she was warmed by its glow and could think of nothing except growing old with him surrounded by their many children. Ahead of them had been such bright, beautiful, and perfect future.

Now, looking at what this land had become, and what her future had _really_ become…

She drew a ragged breath. Before she’d finished it, though, she felt Sylvanas’ hand on her arm. It was surprisingly gentle. “The past is gone. For all of us.”

Jaina swallowed back tears. She wasn’t going to cry for him; not again. “I know.”

“Do you?” Sylvanas turned her around. Her expression was unreadable, but there was a bitter note to her voice. “Because you still dwell on it.”

Jaina shook her head. “Only because we’re here,” she said. She looked up at Sylvanas for a moment. “I’m sorry, I know we didn’t come here to mourn, but I just see this place, and…” She considered the feeling. “And it’s hard not to remember what it was like when I thought I had this beautiful life ahead of me. I couldn’t wait to live it.”

Sylvanas’ face crumpled into a scowl. “That is a feeling with which I am _well_ acquainted.”

Jaina grimaced, putting a hand on Sylvanas’ arm. “Of course you are. I’m sorry for bringing it up.”

Clearly keen to speak no more of it, Sylvanas waved away the topic with a hand. “You’re right, though: we didn’t come here to mourn,” she said, her voice hardening. “I came here to take the last thing I can from him.” For the first time since they’d arrived, a ghost of a smile rose to her lips.  

 _Oh,_ Jaina’s own lips parted. Oh yes: why they were there. She’d been so lost in her memories she’d forgotten why Sylvanas had insisted they come.  

She closed her jaw, feeling uneasy as she thought about the reason now; it had all seemed much less real when they’d been lazing in the beautiful Kul Tiras afternoon sun. “Perhaps it’s not such a good idea.”

“Nonsense. It’s a truly spectacular idea.” Straightening, Sylvanas took a step towards Jaina so she had to step back—and kept going she’d pushed Jaina up against the cool surface of Arthas’ tall headstone and pinned her there with her hips. “It’s the best idea you’ve had since you thought you might try your own little private ‘peace talks’ with me.”

“I said it in jest, Sylvanas, and only because I know how much you hate him.”

Sylvanas wasn’t convinced. “And yet, here you are.” Her fingers trailed the low neckline of Jaina’s dress. “Stop lying to yourself, Jaina, part of you is _angry_ with him, too. He cast you aside, put you on hold, and you suffered for his perpetual indecision. Don’t tell me you never wanted to hurt him because of that.”

Jaina winced. She hadn’t been angry enough at him to wish ill of him at that point—not yet. “That doesn’t erase our childhood together. I have so many good memories of us.”

“Oh, yes, your ‘good memories’ of our dear, benevolent King…” Now, she sounded bitter.

“Sylvanas…”

“Is clinging to distant memories how you wish to live your life now? Because if you’d prefer to sit by his cold grave and merrily think to yourself about how much you loved him and wish you were still living your _beautiful future_ with him, I’m not sure why I need to be—”

“ _Sylvanas_ ,” Jaina said, that firm inflection in her voice. “Don’t.”

Sylvanas obviously had more to say, but she bit her lip down on it. Eyes veiled, she mumbled, “I don’t like how you speak of him.”

Jaina rested her hands on her partner’s hips. “They’re just memories. You said it yourself: the past is gone.”

That set her off again. “Then why do you dwell on it? There is nothing wrong with your present: you are the most powerful mage in Azeroth, a ruler of your people, you are bedding the Warchief of the—”

“Do you think I’d rather be with him now?”

Sylvanas’ flinched as if she’d been struck. “Yes.”

“Well, wouldn’t you rather be alive and with Nathanos?”

Lips still pressed in a tight line, eyes still veiled, Sylvanas wasn’t looking at her. “That’s different. Nathanos didn’t kill you.”

Jaina stopped; that was a fair point. She spent a few moments considering the impact of it, wondering if perhaps she _was_ being insensitive. “He didn’t…” she said, thinking. “I wonder how I’d feel if this situation were reversed, he _had_ killed me, and I was listening to you talking about how many happy memories you had of him…”

That brought Sylvanas out of her shell ever so slightly. Her shoulders loosened. She didn’t speak right away, though—they stood there for a moment in the twilight, leaning against the stone. She was also the first to break that silence. “Enough of this.” Her hands hovered at the straps of her bodice. “Let’s defile this cursed place.”

Jaina lay her hands over Sylvanas’. “Let’s go back to Kul Tiras instead,” she suggested. “We can go back to the cottage and—”

“No. Here.”

Jaina made a face. “Sylvanas, he’s not somewhere he can see what we do. You said that yourself.”

“Then why are you so very concerned with sheltering his feelings if you know he can’t see you?” she asked Jaina, a raw edge to her voice. “Why should it matter what you do or do not do on his grave if we are the only two people here? If he is truly in the past for you—truly—then why must you weep over him, speak of him as if he achieved sainthood, and lament your broken dreams as if you’ll never have new ones?” Her jaw was set so tightly. “What is so wrong with your present that you must dwell so much in the past?”

 _What is so wrong with your present…_  Suddenly, Jaina understood why Sylvanas had been pressing her since they’d arrived.

Before Jaina could respond, though, Sylvanas brought their bodies together again. “Lay with me here,” she said, so close that if she’d had breath, it would warmed Jaina’s cheek.

Rather than push her away this time, Jaina put a hand on Sylvanas’ cheek; their faces were so close it nearly touched her own. She shook her head ever so slightly. “I can’t,” she said quietly. “But it’s not because I’m unhappy with my present.”

Sylvanas had opened her mouth to reply; but Jaina brought their lips together before she could. It was a light kiss and Sylvanas could probably have spoken anyway, but she didn’t. After a moment, she pulled back, her dimly glowing eyes searching Jaina’s. What she expected to find, Jaina couldn’t know. Instead of asking, though, Jaina just gently smiled at her. Immediately, Sylvanas’ face crumpled, and in a heartbeat she’d driven her lips roughly against Jaina’s, crushing them both against the headstone.

Even now, how Sylvanas kissed her was always a shock. She kissed with such ferocity and such desperation that Jaina had initially been quite worried that she wouldn’t be able to sate Sylvanas’ passions; later, she learnt Sylvanas had no passions. The need she kissed with wasn’t the same as the need Arthas and Kalec had kissed her with. It was something else, something different.

It was such a visceral experience; between throes she’d always pull back, eyes open, Jaina’s face cupped tightly between her hands as if she’d trapped a wild bird and it was struggling to escape. Jaina sometimes had to gently rescue her face from that grip, massaging those tight muscles until they were loose.

She kissed Sylvanas like steering a ship through a wild tempest—managing each violent wave as it hit the bow, steering the vessel upright until choppy waters smoothed into calm and restful sea.

It wasn’t long before the storm was past. Jaina took that opportunity to pause for a moment. “Let’s go back,” she murmured.

At first, she thought Sylvanas might protest—but she didn’t speak at all. She just looked so very tired. Closing her eyes for a moment, she nodded once.

Jaina didn’t waste a moment returning to her secret cottage—a vague favour she had asked of one of the older families in Kul Tiras. With a warm bed, a stoked fire and surrounded by wall of tall cliffs, they undressed each other and lay together. Sylvanas couldn’t feel anything the way Jaina did, but Jaina had found it brought her peace to go through the motions. As they lay together afterwards, limbs entangled, Jaina began to wonder if really had been such a mistake to visit Arthas’ grave, even if they’d fought.

As if on cue, Sylvanas spoke. “I know a can be harsh with you,” she said quietly. “But I hope you understand that it isn’t because I find this arrangement unsustainable.”

Jaina had to laugh a little at how she’d phrased that. “Nor do I,” she told her. “But perhaps let’s just visit the coast next time.”

Sylvanas gave her a lazy half-smile, her fingertips tracing Jaina’s cheek. “Sleep now. I will wake you if someone comes.”

Following her advice, Jaina closed her eyes and let her head sink into the plush pillow. There were a great many complications with this relationship, that much was true. But for all the headaches it caused her, and for all it was different than where she imagined she’d be, she decided there wasn’t anything so terrible about her present, after all.

 

 

 

 

 

 


End file.
